


Keep The Lights On

by Shirohime



Category: The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Gen, M/M, Night Terrors, Nightmares, Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-13
Updated: 2020-11-13
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:42:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27534706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shirohime/pseuds/Shirohime
Summary: Alec wakes without Magnus there.
Relationships: Magnus Bane & Alec Lightwood, Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood
Comments: 2
Kudos: 120





	Keep The Lights On

**Author's Note:**

> Nightmares can be frightening things.  
> This is just one way one might react to a bad bad nightmare, it is in no way a thing that's easily captured or explained.  
> If you ever woke up screaming from a dream you couldn't even remember you know how hard it is to calm down and how taxing and absolutely exhausting it can be.

Jace was the one with the night terrors.  
That was the way it had always been, and Alec never had had reason to doubt that. More often than not, up until they were in their late teens, Alec would be woken up by a shaking Jace, eyes wide with unspoken horrors and alight with fear.  
He'd always simply shuffled aside and pulled his parabatai close before nodding off to sleep again and Jace had never complained, just as quick to fall back asleep as soon as he was no longer alone.  
It was easy. Uncomplicated. Nothing noteworthy. Which is why Alec had never thought twice about it.

Now though, now was a different story entirely.

Since practically moving in with Magnus Alec's nights had become surprisingly quiet. There was nobody running past his room in the middle of the night and unless he was called in for an emergency he actually got to have a decent amount of of deep sleep every night.  
It didn't bother him, he would simply listen to Magnus breathing rhythmically whenever he found himself waking up for no good reason except for with a stuttering heart.

But Magnus wasn't here now.

He was downstairs, at Pandemonium, spending the night saving his reputation as someone highly powerful and not the Shadowhunters' pet as more and more clients seemed inclined to believe him to be.

And it was fine.

Except it wasn't, because Alec had woken up choking on silent screams, trembling from top to bottom like a leaf in late autumn, shaken from a nightmare that was little more than vague emotions now but no less terrifying.  
Alec's eyes switched around the moonlit room in aborted, jerky movements while he tried desperately to get some air into his lungs.  
Sweat chilled his bare torso, he'd scrambled upwards the second he was aware enough to do so. Now he was sitting folded in on himself halfway, panting half-breaths. His fingers ached with how tightly he was gripping the sheets.

High, whiney noises escaped his throat when he couldn't seem to calm down. Sleep still addled his brain and left him confused and exhausted despite the adrenaline spiking his blood into overdrive.  
Alec couldn't breathe. He couldn't get in enough air, nausea rising in his stomach. Was this how he was going to die? He'd heard that nightmares could kill people, send their hearts working too much so they would suffer heart attacks from it.

He didn't want to die.  
Not when Magnus was just lighting up his world, bringing color to the desolate places of his soul he'd long resigned to being lost forever.

Everything was too much and too little.  
Grasping at his own hair Alec squeezed his eyes shut but that made everything worse.  
Air rasped out his mouth and he couldn't-, if he could only _think_ clearly for just a minute.

Chairman Meow's sleepy rumble startled his eyes open.  
The cat was stalking over the rumpled sheets, gently headbutting Alec's elbow.  
And it grounded the shadowhunter. It did.  
It just didn't make the heart-wrenching and absolute terror even slightly better.

"Help", he whispered, half whimpered towards the cat that just kept purring and trying to get some pets out of Alec.

There wasn't even enough brain capacity left for Alec to feel embarrassed, to feel stupid and weak. To think it was just a bad dream.

Minutes, what seemed like hours, passed with Alec failing at forcing his breath to slow down, forcing his heart to calm down, before he could function enough to grab his phone off the nightstand without daring to move his head.  
Something about staring stubbornly at one spot somewhere between the sheets and Chairman Meow spoke of safety and that was all Alec processed in his mind at the moment.

The next thing he knew he was pressing the cold phone to his ear, listening to the dialing.  
When it stopped Alec didn't wait for Magnus to speak first as he usually did.  
"Mag-, I can't, help-", he forced out in several breaths that got stuck somewhere between his heart and his lungs.

"Alexander? What's going on?", Magnus' voice was the rock in a stormy sea but it also made Alec aware just how stormy that sea was and how he was about to have his little boat keel over any second.  
He couldn't answer. Could only wheeze out a dry sob and cling to the phone.

Maybe Magnus said something. Alec couldn't remember. Couldn't _focus_.   
His joints were aching hollowly with how tense his muscles were but Alec was unable to loosen them. Unable to change anything of his posture because if he did he would surely fall apart.  
His vision blurred.

Then there was a soft sound, a voice talking to him, fingers brushing over his hand and taking the phone away.

"Alexander." The tender care in that word alone made Alec want to vomit, the world tilted and crashed in over itself. His mind blanked out.

Still, on instinct, he feverishly searched for Magnus' hand, clinging to it so tightly he was sure it'd break a normal person's bones.

"Can't breathe-", Alec choked out between clenched teeth, trying to ground himself.

"Can I touch you?"

Before the words registered, Alec was shaking his head violently, swallowing down bile.  
The flare of panic gave him the strength to look up, climb towards his boyfriend's eyes which were dark with worry and swirling with a determined calm that transfixed Alec.

Alec was so tired.  
Yet the mere thought of closing his eyes caught his breath again so his eyes stung as he tried to push away everything that wasn't Magnus' dark eyes, the warmth and steadiness of his hand still heavy with silver rings.

Gratitude flooded his mind when Magnus didn't ask any more of him, simply sat down on the bed without his eyes wavering, and waited.  
Blue magic eventually rolled out of the warlock's skin, flicking on the main light of their bedroom.

That simple act had the nausea in Alec subside to a nuisance rather than a demand.  
Agonizingly slow, Alec's brain started to work again in bits and pieces, coughing and hacking back to life, an old machine covered with rust from a heavy downpour.

"Magnus", he breathed out when air rushed into his lungs once again.  
The tremor in his body became near painful with every smidge of adrenaline fading away and Alec could suddenly barely keep from tumbling into unconsciousness.

"I'm here, Alexander. Take all the time you need. I'm not going anywhere", Magnus assured him in a low voice, lightly squeezing Alec's shaking fingers.

The shadowhunter forced in and out some deep breaths, shivering at the onslaught of sensations the panic had held back.  
It was as though his entire body was covered in ants whilst simultaneously his bones ached the way they did during a bad cold.

"I'm sorry-", he stopped to breathe again, heart still hammering away in his chest, " I don't know-"

Magnus interrupted him gently but sternly. "Don't apologize. I've been having a dreadful time at the club without you anyways. You're more important to me than some sleezy douchebags."

Alec was too tired to smile at the words so clearly meant to comfort him. "Don't know what happened", he admitted, glad that the talking distracted his mind, confused his heart and made it believe it wasn't in danger anymore.

"A nightmare, I'd assume",Magnus hummed, his thumb rubbing soothing circles into Alec's hand, "do you remember what you dreamt of?"

Alec frowned. "I don't -, no."

Exhaustion tugged at him and only when Magnus slowly reached out towards his face did he realize his cheeks were wet with tears.  
He didn't pull away when the warlock brushed under his eyes, taking the moisture with him.

"Well, then it doesn't matter", Magnus decided, "Do you want a cup of tea? Chamomile does wonders to calm down."

Tiredly Alec shook his head, not caring when his form slumped and he let himself fall sideways and then be caught by Magnus' strong arms. 

Safe, safe, safe.

A mantra being born inside his brain.  
There was a hurricane raging inside but Alec didn't have the energy to even figure out what thoughts were at this point.

"Stay. Please", he begged, sweatsoaked hair plastered to his face plastered to Magnus' suit jacket.  
The smell of sandalwood worked on Alec's body like the strongest of sleeping pills.

"Of course, darling. Will you let me dress us in something more comfortable? You are shivering."

Eyes closing on their own accord, Alec nodded.  
Magic tugged at him and dried his skin, swaddled it in fabric.  
Under normal circumstances Alec hated sleeping in more than his boxers. He always ran too hot, tending to sweat even when it was crisp outside. Now he snuggled into the worn fabric of what had to be one of his sweatshirts and buried his head further against Magnus' shoulder.

Magnus pulled him back against the headboard, his one hand still captured by Alec the other carding through tousled black hair.  
The shadowhunter didn't fight him, boiled raw from the inside out by the still receding fear.

"Do you want to keep the lights on?", Magnus rumbled soothingly when Alec was dozing off right there in his arms.

Hesitantly Alec nodded, not allowing himself to overthink the vulnerable state he was in, the power Magnus held over him in these quiet moments caught between awake and asleep. Should the warlock get up and leave, Alec would break apart like fine china.

**Author's Note:**

> Nightmares CAN kill someone, though it is very rare.


End file.
